POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS, POLICYMAKING PROCESSES,
AND POLICY OUTCOMES:
THE CASE OF MEXICO
Submitted by:
Fabrice Lehoucq, Project Leader
Francisco Aparicio
Allyson Benton
Benito Nacif
Gabriel Negretto
Division of Political Studies
Centro de Investigaciones y Docencia Económicas (CIDE), A.C.
Carret. México-Toluca 3655
Lomas de Santa Fe
México, DF 01210
Corresponding author:
Fabrice Lehoucq
Tel. No.: 52 55/5727-9800,
x2106, x2108 (division),
Or x2215 (direct).
Fax No.: 52 55/5727-9871.
E-mail: [email protected]
August 15, 2003
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Introduction
Since the mid-1980s, Mexican policy makers have liberalized a closed economy,
renegotiated the external debt, privatized state companies, decentralized public
administration, and signed a historic free-trade agreement with Canada and the United
States (Lustig, 1998; Middlebrook and Zepeda, 2003). Technocratic capture of a one-party
system (Centeno, 1997), one where the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) controlled
all branches and levels of government, made Mexico one of the first Latin American
countries to adopt market-based reforms—an unexpected outcome given that the PRI had
nationalized so much of the economy in the previous decades.
Enactment of further political economic reforms, however, will be hard to
accomplish. State corporations continue to exercise monopoly control over petroleum,
gas, and electricity. While no one disputes that the future viability of these sectors requires
major new investments, political parties and interest groups are unable to agree to drop
constitutional prohibitions on private investment in energy—a key source of institutional
rigidity in the Mexican political economy. Similarly, though all parties agree on the need
to overhaul an inefficient tax system that collects no more than 12 percent of GDP, little
agreement exists on how this should be accomplished. Like so many other policy areas in
Mexico, tax and energy policy remain remarkably stable because divided government—
perhaps the single most important outcome of the PRI’s defeat in the 2000 presidential
elections—now permits partisan and corporatist interests to block structural reforms.
The Division of Political Studies (DEP) of the Centro de Investigación y Docencia
Económicas (CIDE) plans to explain how institutional arrangements sustain the outer
limits of policymaking in Mexico. If this proposal is funded, the DEP will show how,
paradoxically enough, a liberalized political system is now hindering the structural reforms
the country sorely needs. Concretely, our proposed study will show how a multiparty
system and the separation of powers leads to the divided government that enables
entrenched interests to veto agreement on important reforms.
The first section of this proposal uses the framework in Spiller, Stein, and
Tommasi (2003 or DP1) and Scartascini and Olivera (2003 or DP2) to characterize the
outer features of policymaking in Mexico since the late 1980s (though we will identify
changes and continuities with the ISI model in effect between the 1940s and the 1980s).
We show that policy volatility has declined even as the quality of public services remains
low and focused on maintaining the privileges of powerful economic sectors. With some
exceptions, the Mexican state showers benefits on key economic sectors and urban
populations and remains a largely liberal creature—one that asks little of its citizens and,
as a result, gets little from them in return. In the second section, we present hypotheses,
methods, and data sources to guide our effort to uncover the interactions between and the
dynamics of particular institutional arenas, including the (1) electoral system, (2) political
parties, (3) legislative bodies, (4) the presidency, (5) executive-legislative relations, (6) the
Supreme Court, (7) the bureaucracy, and (8) intergovernmental relations. The third
section identifies the members of the team and discusses their capabilities. The final
section offers a budget.
2
Public Policy in Mexico: the Outer Features
Mexico is a middle-income country. It has the tenth largest economy in the world
and is commonly listed as one of the key emerging markets. During the twentieth century,
Mexico has gone from being an agro-export economy to one dominated by services and
manufacturing exports. In 1910, more than 70 percent of the population was illiterate and
lived in rural areas. Ninety years later, only a bit more than a fifth of its population is rural
and only 10 percent remains illiterate. Between 1950 and 1998, Mexico almost basically
its GDP per capita. In 1990 international dollars, its GDP went from 2,365 in 1950 to
6,655 in 1998 (Maddison, 2001).
In a region where most countries have not doubled their GDP per capita rates
between 1950 and 1998, Mexico is one of Latin America’s success stories. Between 1950
and 1973, the heyday of Import Substitution Industrialization (ISI), the GDP per capita
growth rate was an average of 3.17 percent before dropping to 1.28 percent between1973
and 2000 (Maddison, 2001: 196). Even with major economic crises in 1968, 1976, 1982,
1987, and 1994 (Basáñez, 1990; Lustig, 1998), a GDP volatility rate of 4 percent between
1960 and 1998 places Mexico below the average of volatility rates in both Latin American
and East Asia during these four decades (IADB, 2000: 6). Nevertheless, throughout the
post-World War II period, East Asian countries have had consistently higher growth rates
that transformed poorer societies into much richer ones. South Korea, for example, has
gone from a GDP per capita rate of $770 (in 1990 international dollars) in 1950 to more
than 12,152 dollars in 1998 and a growth rate per capita of nearly 9 percent during this
period (Maddison, 2001: 215-6).
Until the 1980s, the Mexican policy framework remained stable and favored urban
interests. Trade policy kept the economy closed to international competition. More than
60 percent of national production was covered by a system of import permits and tariffs
that added more than a fifth to the cost of national production (Lustig, 1998: 162). Social
programs were conferred on urban populations and economically important sectors.
Though Mexican society was predominately rural until the 1960s, the state did not furnish
medical services, old age pensions, or anti-poverty programs for the rural population until
well into the 1990s. Throughout the twentieth century, landless peasants could only
petition the president for property—an arduous and time-consuming process that ended
with rural communities collectively holding their new lands, many of which were located
on remote and unsuitable areas (Warman, 2001). As a result, income inequality remains
one of the highest rates in Latin America, already the most unequal region of the world.
Lustig (1998: 258) reports Gini indexes in the range of 0.58-0.62 between 1984 and 1992.
As of 2000, the national statistics institute (INEGHI) reports that 50 million Mexicans—or
50 percent of the population—live in poverty.
Recurrent economic crises undermined the stability of ISI policies in the 1980s.
Starting under the Presidency of Miguel de la Madrid (1982-88), policymakers stopped
increasing state spending to shore up demand and to reactivate the economy. With the
1982 debt crisis, when Mexico declared a moratorium on its foreign debt of 90 billion
dollars, policymakers began to open up an inward-looking, closed economy. They
eliminated tariff rates and subsidies for domestic industry. President Carlos Salinas (198894) reformed the constitution to stop the redistribution of land and to permit the
privatization of collective landholdings (ejidos). Reformers also privatized large swaths of
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the public sector. Most importantly, Mexico signed a free-trade agreement with its
northern neighbors, an agreement that is now credited with modernizing the economy and
restoring economic growth. After the 1994 financial meltdown, economic growth picked
up again during Ernesto Zedillo’s administration (1994-2000) before slowing down during
the first half of Vicente Fox’s administration (2000-6).
Despite macroeconomic policy innovation, other public policy areas remain stable.
First, policymakers did not begin to redirect public spending to address poverty and
inequality until well into the twentieth century. Until the 1990s, education, health, and
pension programs disproportionately favored urban sectors. In a series of benefit incident
analyses, John Scott (2002) shows that the absolute impact of 14 social programs is
slightly regressive in absolute terms, but is slightly progressive given the highly unequal
distribution of household income and assets in Mexico. Only in the 1990s did
policymakers begin to channel important resources into anti-poverty programs (like
PROGRESA, which is now called Oportunidades) and to redirect spending from higher
education (which benefits urban middle and upper classes) to primary education. Though
record numbers of the poor now get a public education, many analysts question the quality
of the education most Mexicans receive and its ability to prepare students for a
competitive, globalized economy (e.g., Giugale, et. al., 2001: 447-78).
Second, tax revenues remain unusually low. Though the public sector survives on
slightly less than a fifth of the GDP, it only collects 10-12 percent as taxes—next to
Guatemala, the lowest rate of taxation in Latin America and the lowest for a middleincome country (IADB, 2000). Other revenue sources include social security taxes
(approximately 2 percent) and royalties from PEMEX (3-5 percent). The tax code is also
full of loopholes, exemptions created to seal deals that trade subsidies for private sector
investment and political support (Elizondo Mayer-Serra, 2001). A low public debt to GDP
ratio (even including the unofficial public debt, it stands at 46 percent of GDP [Giugale, et.
al., 2001: 6]) and the income that PEMEX generates is what keeps the fiscal picture under
control. Until public officials and citizens agree to raise taxes, however, the Mexican state
will rest on precarious foundations and be unable to make necessary investments in human
and physical capital.
Third, given the highly limited tax system, state corporations do not have the
capital to invest in gas and petroleum exploration or in meeting the electricity needs of the
economy. The World Bank (Giugale, et. al., 2001: 357) estimates that $US10 billion a
year (or, in 1995 peso terms, 2.5 of GDP, which is the combined size of the health and
education budgets) is needed to meet expected growth in demand. Limited investments in
the energy sector, in fact, are being undertaken by joint public-private sector efforts whose
constitutionality an increasingly assertive Supreme Court may call into question. The
Mexican constitution stands alone in preventing private sector investment in the energy
sector by maintaining electricity, gas, and petroleum as exclusive domains of the state.
These, then, are the outer limits of public policy in Mexico. While Mexico
switched from a closed to an open macroeconomic framework in the 1980s, social and
physical investments remain limited by a chronically under funded state. If this proposal is
funded, we will more rigorously analyze the outer limits of tax, social, and energy policy.
We will combine objective measures of policy stability, rigidity, quality, and distributional
4
effects with subjective indicators to devise an accurate and analytically tractable portrait of
state policy in Mexico since the late 1980s.
Political Institutions: Hypotheses, Methods, and Data Sources
What accounts for the consolidation of macro-economic policy changes and
institutional rigidity? In this section, we present two hypotheses to explain the general
dynamics of the political system before presenting specific hypotheses to guide research
into relevant institutional arenas.
Our first general hypothesis is that Mexican policy changed in the 1980s because
unified governments made the president omnipotent (Carpizo, 1978; Krause, 1997), even
though, in constitutional terms, the Mexican executive is not particularly strong (Casar,
2002; Weldon, 1997). While the centralization of power made the state unresponsive to
citizen demands, it was sensitive to changes in executive preferences. Indeed, unified
government empowered presidents to innovate, even if corporatist interests and a rigid
bureaucracy made it hard to carry out structural reforms.
Our second general hypothesis is that the arrival of divided government inhibits
further policy changes because it empowers the interests that oppose private investment in
the energy sector as well as tax and educational reforms. An inclusive electoral system
maintains a multiparty system, one that amplifies the power of rural, corporatist, and,
increasingly, local interests. The separation of powers thrusts Congress into the role of the
dominant law-making branch during periods of divided government, even as term limits
undermine its ability to develop the expertise needed to monitor an unprofessional and
rigid bureaucracy that, oddly enough, divided government seems to be helping to reform.
An ever more assertive Supreme Court, one whose preferences on many issues remain
unclear, contributes to the uncertainty about whether reforms by executive order (e.g., the
limited joint private-public ventures in electric generation and gas exploration) are
constitutional and therefore credible. Finally, the gradual, but steady shift of policy
responsibilities to states and municipalities is expanding the number of veto players in an
increasingly vibrant federation. Divided government, in other words, is here to stay in
Mexico, even if its central dynamics remain unsettled because of electoral uncertainty and
regional fragmentation.
We now turn to identifying the institutional arrangements that permit the
corporatist structures of the Mexican political economy to stymie further reforms. In each
of the following subsections, we present hypotheses about particular institutional arenas to
guide our research.
The Electoral System. The Mexican electoral system for the Chamber of Deputies
and the Senate are mixed systems that ban incumbents from running for consecutive
reelection. In the lower house, 300 deputies are elected for three-year terms in singlemember, plurality districts (SMPD). An additional 200 deputies are also elected to threeyear terms in five multi-member districts using PR. In the upper house, each of the 31
states has one senator elected on a plurality basis, a second senator is awarded to the
second runner-up, and the third (and last) senator is awarded according its share of the
national Senate votes. While the Mexican mixed system is one of the least proportional of
its genre (Colomer, 2002)—it, for example, allows disproportionality between vote and
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seat shares up to 8 percent—it still encourages the development of a multiparty system and
therefore to the maintenance of divided government.
Lehoucq has three hypotheses about the incentives that the Mexican electoral
system generates. First, he hypothesizes that single ballots in each of these legislative
races, along with the ban on consecutive reelection, limits accountability. When combined
with candidate selection rules (discussed in the next section), both of these features make
deputy and Senate careers dependent upon party leaders and secondarily upon voters.
Second, Lehoucq hypothesizes that districting amplifies the power of rural interests,
especially in the Chamber of Deputies. Approximately 38 percent of the SMPD are
predominately rural, even though only slightly more than a fifth of the electorate lives in
rural areas and contributes no more than 5 percent to national GDP. Furthermore, despite
the 8 percent disproportionality limit, the majoritarian component does reward parties that
obtain pluralities in as many districts as possible. Finally, based on Colomer (2002) and
Negretto and Colomer (2003), Lehoucq hypothesizes that the requirement of winning a
plurality of the vote in one, national district to obtain the presidency for a six-year term
increases the policy distance between the president and the median legislator. In sum,
electoral laws discourage the convergence on policy between the legislative and executive
branches of government.
Statistical models of aggregate data and of public opinion surveys (e.g., CIDE’s
public opinion database) and secondary sources (e.g., Moreno, 2003) will show that older,
less educated, and more rural voters cast ballots for the PRI, the party most committed to
nationalist control of the energy sector. Lehoucq will also compare issue surveys of voters
and of deputies to determine whether the electorate’s preferences are represented in the
Chamber of Deputies.
Political Parties: After seventy years of one-party domination, Mexico has had a
multiparty system with an average number of effective parties of 3.05 since 1997, when the
PRI first lost its legislative majority. The Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD),
which obtains approximately 20 percent of the vote and predominates in the federal district
and a handful of central and southern states, is the most left and nationalist party. The PRI,
who saw its total of the vote fall to 32 percent in the 2003 midterm elections, remains the
most conservative party on values and, until 2000, was also the least identified with the
redistribution of wealth. The National Action Party (PAN) also attracts the support of a
third of the voters. It is a liberal party on social issues and is the party most consistently in
favor of economic liberalization.
Political competition is structured around two dimensions: a classic left vs. right
axis and a values axis pitting social conservatives (who tend to be older and less educated
and live in rural areas) against social progressives (who are younger, more educated, and
live in urban areas) (Moreno, 2003). As of 2003, the party system remains in flux, but
citizens place all parties—especially the PRI—more to the left on economic issues like the
importance attached to income redistribution than they did in the 1990s. Most Mexicans
tend to hover around the middle and rightist sides of the political spectrum and, depending
on the survey, 30 to 50 percent do not identify with a party. Surveys also repeatedly show
that a slight majority of Mexicans oppose changing the constitution to permit private sector
investment in the energy sector and to tax reforms that typically imply taxing food and
medicines, goods now exempt from value added taxes.
6
Lehoucq hypothesizes that the internal nomination procedures of the three principal
parties empower the constituencies most opposed to structural reform—and thus block
efforts to expand the constituency for such reforms. In the PRI, corporatist structures and
governors struggle to place their candidates on the party ticket (Langston, 2001, 2002,
2003), thus amplifying the voices of the sectors often most committed to maintaining the
status quo. In the PRD, nomination procedures maintain the power of sectors ideologically
committed to the nationalist control of strategic sectors (Bruhn, 1997; Prud’homme, 1996).
A territorially based party that nevertheless preserves important prerogatives for national
leaders rewards long-term members of the PAN with candidacies to advance the party’s
liberal agenda (Loaeza, 1999; Prud’homme, 1997). Generous public campaign funds make
party backing indispensable for a political career, a factor whose importance is reinforced
by the ban on consecutive reelection and the existence of party lists in PR districts.
Lehoucq will evaluate these claims by drawing upon the work of Joy Langston,
who has used biographical dictionaries of legislators and other sources to identify their
factional background of PRI legislators. He will use similar sources to identify the
factional backgrounds of PAN and PRI deputies. Lehoucq will also rely upon surveys of
legislators and citizens to determine to what extent party delegations reflect the preferences
of their core constituencies as well as voters as a whole. Both can be obtained from
polling organizations, many of whose results are published in Mexico City newspapers.
Congress: The Mexican Congress is a case of symmetric bicameralism: the
Chamber of Deputies and the Senate are equal partners in the law-making process, even
though they are elected for elective periods of different lengths and from dissimilar
constituencies. Each chamber is structured around a system of forty standing committees
consisting of twenty legislators each. The internal organization of Congress undermines its
ability to devise policies for complex structural reforms—a task that divided government
requests that the legislature perform.
The first of Nacif’s hypothesis about the internal organization of Congress is that
high levels of centralization within parties tend to reduce inter-cameral differences in the
law-making process, even though deputies and senators face different incentives. Senators
have six-year terms while deputies only stay in office for three years. Two-thirds of all
senators represent states while the remaining third are elected from a national constituency.
In contrast, three-fifths of all deputies represent much smaller districts and the remaining
two-fifths are elected from one of five, regional constituencies. During the long period of
unified government there were very few cases of inter-branch conflict, an outcome that is
formally resolved through navette (which provides for the sequential consideration of bills
by both chambers of Congress [Tsebelis and Money, 2000]). Under divided government
the possibility of conflict between the two chambers has increased, but the fact that
electoral institutions guarantee that both chambers have a similar partisan composition
maintains a significant degree of congruence (Powell, 2000).
Second, Nacif hypothesizes that the centralization within political parties and the
high levels of membership turnover weakens the influence of standing committees by
impairing specialization and the accumulation of expertise (Nacif, 2002; Ugalde, 2000).
As a result, Congress relies mainly on external sources of information and expertise to
initiate and evaluate policy proposals, especially in complex areas like energy and tax
policy.
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This study will look at three sources of data: first, roll call vote analysis will assess
levels of party unity and congruence of parties across chambers. Second, analysis of career
patterns will reveal if previous legislative experience is related to the holding of committee
chairmanships and other positions of influence within a legislature with high levels of
membership turnover. Third, the fate of bills in the revising chamber will show if there are
any differences in inter-cameral relations in unified government versus divided
government. Finally, Nacif will analyze a sample of key bills to identify the role that
relevant committee plays in bill development; if his hypothesis is useful, the party
leadership will take responsibility for bill enactment in association with actors external to
Congress.
The Presidency: Elected to a six-year, non-renewal term, the Mexican president has
the authority to appoint members of the cabinet (consisting of 18 Secretaries of State). He
can also issue executive orders, legal mechanisms especially important for the operation of
the energy sector. With the exception of the Federal Prosecutor, the president can appoint
and remove secretaries of state and other high-ranking administrative officials without
interference from Congress.
Cabinet appointments, the most visible political positions in the administration, are
a function of the president’s interest in rewarding political loyalists, in gaining the support
of influential politicians, and of recruiting policy experts into the administration (Geddes,
1994; Guerrero, 2000). Executive orders are presidential directives requiring or
authorizing some action within the executive branch. What Mayer (2001) says about
executive orders in the U.S. also applies to Mexico: they are “legal instruments that create
or modify laws, procedures and policy by fiat.” Executive orders enable the president to
shape policy by taking advantage of authority explicitly delegated by Congress and of
residual discretion left by constitutional and statutory law. In issuing executive orders,
however, presidents have to anticipate reactions by both Congress and the judiciary, each
of which have the power to rectify any unilateral expansion of executive authority.
Nacif has two sets of hypotheses about the use of executive instruments. The first
set is about presidential cabinet appointments. Under unified government, the president
will appoint a larger proportion of political loyalists and experts to the cabinet. In contrast,
under divided government the president has to recruit politicians into the cabinet that help
him enhance his potential support in Congress. Second, Nacif believes that the president
will issue executive orders in the same way. Under unified government, congressional
majorities will delegate to the executive. Conversely, under divided government we should
more unilateral usage of executive authority.
To test these hypotheses, Nacif will look at two kinds of data: the profiles of
cabinet appointees and types of executive orders. Using the database put together by
Guerrero (2000), he will test whether divided government brought about a change in the
prevailing profile of cabinet members. He will also assemble a database of executive
orders to test whether divided government caused an increase in the unilateral use of
presidential orders.
Executive-Legislative Relations: The legislative powers of the Mexican president
are quite limited: unlike other presidents, the Mexican chief executive is merely reactive in
the law-making process (Shugart and Carey, 1992). The president can introduce bills to
8
Congress, but the legislature has no obligation to act upon them and he has no decreemaking powers. Both the 1917 Mexican constitution and the 1789 US constitution, in fact,
are the two purest examples of the checks and balances version of the separation of powers
(Negretto, 2003).
The most powerful legislative prerogative of the president is the executive veto—a
package veto subject to congressional override by a two-thirds majority. In the
constitutional veto game, the congressional majority has full agenda-setting powers over
the president. It exercises a monopoly over the initiation of law change and can force the
executive into a “take-or-leave-it” situation. Consequently, the president must wait for
Congress to advance legislation and uses his veto threat to influence the legislative
outcome.
Nacif hypothesizes that the Mexican president can use his partisan powers to obtain
support from the legislature. The partisan powers of the Mexican president stem from the
combination of two institutional features: legislative term limits and presidential patronage
(Weldon, 1997; Casar, 2002). Cooperation with the executive branch is the legislative
contingent of the president’s party’s best strategy, one that furthers their individual careers.
Accordingly, presidents take on a proactive role in the policy making process and become
the main source of law change. Nacif also hypothesizes that, under divided government,
opposition deputies will cooperate with the executive only when there is convergence of
preferences because opposition legislator career advancement depends on placating the
national leadership of their own parties (Nacif, 2000). As a result, Nacif expects the
presidency to become reactive in the law-making process under divided government,
ceding most of the initiative to parliamentary groups and using the veto threat as its most
important instrument to influence law change.
Nacif will examine three variables to test whether divided government has caused a
change in the role of the executive in the law making process. Identifying bill sponsors
will reveal the ability of the executive to control the congressional agenda vis-à-vis other
sources of legislation. Analysis of bill amendments will show if independent law-making
activity at the committee stage responds to the president’s majority support in Congress.
Finally, Nacif expects to see a lower rate of legislative enactment of executive-initiated
bills during divided government.
The Supreme Court: Nominally, the Mexican Supreme Court has been able to
restrain the law-making powers of presidents and legislators since 1917. Until recently,
however, the Supreme Court had neither the means nor the incentives to fulfill the role of
an independent enforcer of individual rights and constitutional legality. The central
hypothesis of this section is that the constitutional amendments of 1994 and the emergence
of divided government have thrust the Supreme Court into the role of arbitrating conflicts
between the other branches of government, a role that it is only gradually beginning to
assume.
Although the 1917 constitution let the Supreme Court resolve controversies on laws
or acts of political authorities affecting individual guarantees, the sovereignty of the states,
or the federal scope of competences, the Court never acquired the authority to implement
judicial review and to strike down unconstitutional laws. Only indirectly, through amparo
suits originated in the restriction of individual rights and guarantees, could the Court
9
question the constitutionality of laws for individual cases. The distribution of political
power was also an obstacle for the evolution of the Supreme Court as a veto player in the
political process. From the early 1930s to 1997 the Mexican Supreme Court faced a
centralized, disciplined party with unified control over the presidency and Congress.
Moreover, until 1988 the PRI held majorities sufficient to satisfy the two-thirds majority
needed to reform the constitution.
The existence of a unified government with monopoly control over constitutional
reform had two important consequences for the judiciary. The first consequence was that
the PRI could—and did—create a compliant court. Through subsequent amendments, the
president obtained agenda powers over nominations, and the authority to require Congress
to dismiss magistrates accused of “bad conduct.” Moreover, the PRI-dominated Congress
replaced the original system of life tenure with that of fixed tenure for six years, terms that
were made to coincide with that of the president. As a result, an appointment in the
Supreme Court became one more step in a political career within the ruling party
(Domingo, 2000; Fix-Zamudio and Cossio, 1997). The second consequence of unified
government was that it was easy for the PRI to accommodate policy shifts within the
framework of a rigid constitution. For example, although the Mexican constitution was
originally biased toward state intervention in strategic economic sectors, a series of
constitutional amendments in the 1980s made possible for Mexican presidents to
implement sweeping privatization programs and market-oriented policies without facing
challenges in the courts.
These factors led to a general equilibrium in which neither citizens nor judges
would challenge or rule against the PRI. The central hypothesis about the current role of
the Mexican Supreme Court in policymaking is that the 1994 constitutional reforms, which
provided the Court with judicial review powers, and the emergence of divided government
since 1997 should upset that equilibrium.
In December 1994, a constitutional amendment required a two-thirds majority in
the Senate to approve presidential nominations to the Supreme Court. This reform also
extended tenure on the Supreme Court to fifteen years and reduced the number of
Ministers from twenty-six to eleven. Finally, it proscribed candidates whom had
previously occupied political positions from being nominated to the Supreme Court. These
reforms also provided the Supreme Court with the formal power to nullify unconstitutional
norms with general effects and expanded its jurisdiction in the so-called constitutional
controversies. Moreover, the Supreme Court faces a new political scenario, one of divided
government. Since 1988, the party of the president does not control two-thirds majorities
in either the Chamber of Deputies or in the Senate required to reform the constitution;
since 1997, the executive also lacks a majority in at least one the chambers of the
bicameral Congress.
Negretto hypothesizes that these two factors—judicial review and divided
government—should lead to: first, an increase in the number of cases challenging central
government policies and, second, an expansion in the number of Supreme Court decisions
ruling against the validity of laws or of executive orders.
Negretto will evaluate these hypotheses by reviewing secondary sources (e.g., FixZamudio and Cossio, 1997; Domingo, 2000; Magaloni and Negrete, 2001) and by, most
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importantly, analyzing Supreme Court rulings on actions of unconstitutionality and
constitutional controversies between 1995 to the present. This data is available at the online site of the Supreme Court (http://www.scjn.gob.mx).
The Bureaucracy: The Mexican bureaucracy is unprofessionalized, hierarchical,
and overly regulated, although most human resource practices are discretional and
unsystematic. Though Rauch and Evans (2000) indicate that the relative salaries of
Mexican public officials ranks third out of thirty-five developing countries they examine,
Mexico’s overall bureaucratic quality ranks twenty-fifth. As a result, Mexican public
administration hampers the implementation of existing programs and of new approaches to
energy and tax policy.
About 14 percent of public sector positions are patronage appointments; 86 percent
are base employees. Patronage appointees are mid- to high-level officials are nonunionized and receive higher salaries, but their job security is low and their turnover is
high. Base employees mostly belong to the public sector union (FSTSE), which
guarantees them job security and benefits, even though possibilities for job advancement
are limited. As of 1999, there were 4.8 million public employees (or 15 percent of the
PEA), of which 29 percent were federal employees, 51 percent were state and municipal
employees, 10 percent were public enterprises employees, and 10 percent worked for the
Social Security Institute (Just ten years ago, in 1990, this composition was 50.4 percent
federal, 21 percent state and municipal, and 20 percent in public enterprises). As of 1999,
18 percent of government expenditures went to personnel services, and the ratio of average
public/private sector salaries is 2.6 (INEGI, 2001).
The costs of Mexico’s bureaucracy are high, as Rauch and Evan’s ranking of public
administration indicates. Mexico’s anti-corruption controls rank 82nd among 160 countries
surveyed by Kaufmann et al. (2002). The Transparency International corruption
perception index for Mexico is only 3.6, on a 10-point scale (10=clean), making it
comparable to countries like China and Colombia. Red tape and bureaucratic delays also
impact the transaction costs of the private sector and constitute entry barriers for small
businesses. Djankov et al. (2002) estimate that as of 2002, opening a small firm in Mexico
takes about 51 days with associated costs of about 1,000USD.
Until 2003, no extensive civil service law existed in Mexico. The new Ley del
Servicio Profesional de Carrera en la Administración Pública Federal (enacted on April
10, 2003) introduces some basic features of a professional bureaucracy: meritocratic
recruitment through competitive examinations, civil service procedures for hiring and
firing, and internal promotion to higher office levels. Before 2003, similar procedures only
covered about 10 percent of all federal employees (Benton, 2002).
Under ideal circumstances, delegating policies to an independent but accountable
bureaucracy helps “to enforce inter-temporal political agreements,” and to establish a longterm principal to monitor the bureaucracy (Spiller and Tommasi, 2003). The tension
between bureaucratic expertise and political control can be solved through legislation,
long-term relationships, and/or congressional oversight (Epstein and O’Halloran, 1999).
These approaches, however, assume that the capabilities of both bureaucrats and legislators
are satisfactory to begin with (Huber and McCarty, 2002)—highly questionable
assumptions, as this and earlier sections on Congress reveal.
11
Aparicio presents three hypotheses to assess the impact of divided government on
bureaucratic performance. First, building upon Geddes (1994), he suggests that divided
government facilitates civil service reform by changing the equilibrium agreements
between bureaucrats and policymakers. Under unified government, bureaucratic reform
was undesirable or unfeasible. Before 1980, the unionization of the federal bureaucracy
and the patronage of high office appointments were the accepted rules of the game. Later
on, the crises and reforms between 1980 and 1995 made reform of the public sector
desirable for central policymakers, but unacceptable for bureaucratic interests. After 2000,
without the PRI in the executive, the new administration still supported civil service
reforms. On this occasion, the PRI, which still has a large number of members at different
levels of the bureaucracy, became more interested in making public service safer and less
partisan. Hence, this time the proposed reform became law.
The next two hypotheses focus on the states. Decentralization has shifted the
Mexican public sector towards the states (education and health services, for instance).
With the majority of public employees at subnational levels, it is important to see whether
states adopt the federal reforms or other efficiency-enhancing practices. Hence, a second
hypothesis is that more competitive political processes at the state level induce changes in
the relationship between bureaucrats and subnational principals. Third, divided state
governments induce changes in the relationship between bureaucrats, governors, and state
legislatures. The relevant empirical question is whether these new equilibrium agreements
are efficiency-enhancing or not.
Aparicio will use secondary source data on public sector composition to build
bureaucratic structure and performance indicators similar to Centeno (1999), LaPorta et al.
(1999), and Rauch and Evans (2000). He will use INAP (2001) studies of recent
professional public service programs in selected government agencies to identify the
critical areas of reform. He will also draw upon Arellano (2002), Arellano and Guerrero
(2003), and Schneider and Heredia (2003), which provide essential background materials
on the evolution of bureaucratic reform and decentralization programs during the last
couple decades.
Intergovernmental Relations: The Mexican federation consists of 31 states and a
federal district. Each state has its own constitution, elected governor (six-year, nonrenewal terms), and elected unicameral legislature (three-year, non-renewal terms). Prior
to 1988, presidents appointed the executive or regent of the federal district. States are
subdivided into slightly less than 2,500 municipalities that elect their own councils and
mayors (three-year, non-renewable terms). It was not until the late 1980s that the PRI
began to respect opposition victories at local levels (Cornelius, Eisenstadt, and Hindley,
1999).
Decentralizing reforms were first undertaken in the mid-1980s when the federal
government increased transfers to state and municipal governments, and empowered these
levels to collect their own taxes (Diaz-Cayeros, 1997; Rodríguez, 1997). Administrative
control over some aspects of social spending was also transferred to local levels
(Rodríguez, 1997). As a result, state and local governments began to control larger
portions of total governmental spending, accounting for about 10 percent total
governmental spending in the late 1980s to 20 percent just 10 years later (Ward,
Rodríguez, and Cabrero Mendoza, 1999).
12
Benton hypothesizes that, although decentralizing reforms were begun prior to the
key institutional reforms of the 1990s, democratization has acted to reinforce the process of
decentralization by creating and empowering new groups whose interests lie in increasing
subnational policy authority and fiscal resources. Such groups include local branches of
national political parties or regional political organizations, and civic and other local
citizen associations. Indeed, many formerly apolitical groups now have an interest in
becoming active in state and municipal politics, since newly elected subnational
governments are now able to acquire and spend their own resources, and make policy in
areas formerly reserved for national leaders.
Decentralization has important implications for policymaking and policy outcomes
in Mexico. First, the strengthening of regional interests should increase the number of veto
players in the system. Politics in Mexico have traditionally been organized around
corporatist sectors. As the influence of regional actors grows, their interests will affect the
balance of power within political parties, as well as political alignments within the national
Congress. As the number of veto players increases, policymaking should become less able
to address urgent political, economic, and social needs in times of economic and social
crisis. Numerous, politically heterogeneous veto players are inherently status quo
preserving (Tsebelis, 2002).
Second, though decentralization and the addition of regional representatives to the
system stand to slow national policymaking, those policies that do emerge should deliver
benefits to regions, rather than traditional economic sectors or favored social groups, as in
Argentina and Brazil. This should result in increased redistribution among states and
localities (as in other decentralized systems like Argentina, Brazil, and Colombia), as well
as in an incentive to engage in pork-barrel politics. Such pork-barrel tendencies will
increase the cost of government, leading to inefficient policy outcomes.
Third, increased demands for decentralization should be met with the transfer of
additional policy authority and fiscal resources to local governments. State and municipal
governments will thus have more autonomy to respond to local citizen demands. As a
result, we should see increased variation in policy decisions among local governments (as
noted in Rodríguez and Ward, 1995, and Ward, Rodríguez and Cabrero Mendoza, 1999).
Also, it may very well be that local autonomy will facilitate corruption, as more players
become involved in the administration of governmental funds, and inefficiency, as the
technical capacity of local levels to undertake newly transferred powers is low (as noted in
work by Treisman n.d.; Burki, Javed, Perry, and Dillinger, 1999). This has important
implications for national-local relations. The failure to address citizen needs could
ultimately work to undermine local governments and interest groups, their voice in
national politics, and the willingness of national leaders to address them.
To test the principal hypothesis, Benton will gather data to assess its three main
implications. To understand how decentralization shapes national parties and
Congressional organization, and thus national executive-legislative relations and
policymaking, Benton will use data gathered by Nacif during the course of this study to
investigate how internal party and Congressional organization (committees) have changed
since the introduction of decentralizing (and democratic) reforms. To determine whether
the traditionally sectoral nature of national public policy has changed in favor of regional
interests, Benton will gather information on the types and content of economic
13
development, fiscal, and social policies introduced to the national Congress over the past
20 years. At the local level, Benton expects to see variation in the ability of different
localities to cope with newfound policymaking authority and administrative tasks. Case
studies of state-level policymaking and policy output will ascertain the extent to which
poorer and wealthier regions have risen to the challenges created with decentralization.
Members of the Research Team
The five members of this team have advanced training in political science,
economics, the law, and statistics. Each is completely bilingual in English and Spanish.
Each is conversant with the theory outlined in the project guidelines; each is highly
knowledgeable about Mexico as well as with other Latin American countries.
The appendix contains three-page curriculum vitae for each member of our
multidisciplinary team. Each is a full-time Professor and Researcher in the DEP, CIDE.
Lehoucq will be project leader; we present his biographical sketch last. In alphabetical
order, the members of the team are:
Francisco Aparicio (Ph.D., Economics, George Mason University, 2003
[expected]). His primary research areas are public finance, political economy, and applied
econometrics. He is the author of several articles and papers on campaign finance and has
working experience in policymaking and budgeting issues at the state and federal levels in
Mexico.
Allyson Benton (Ph.D., Political Science, UCLA, 2001). Benton’s fields of interest
include political economy, political parties, and statistics. She is the author of articles in
Comparative Political Studies, Latin American Politics and Society, and Política y
Gobierno.
Benito Nacif (D.Phil, Politics, Oxford University, 1995). Nacif’s fields of interest
are in legislative politics, democratization, and Mexican politics. He is the author of
articles published in Foro Internacional and Política y Gobierno. He is the co-editor with
Scott Morgenstern and contributor to Legislative Politics in Latin America (Cambridge
University Press, 2001).
Gabriel Negretto (Ph.D., Political Science, Columbia University, 2000). Negretto’s
fields of interest include constitutional analysis, executive-legislative relations, and judicial
politics. He is the author of articles in Comparative Political Studies, Desarrollo
Económico, the Journal of Latin American Studies, and the Revista Mexicana de
Sociología.
Fabrice Lehoucq (Ph.D., Political Science, Duke University, 1992) will be project
coordinator. His fields of interest include electoral systems, institutional analysis, and
Latin American politics. He is the author of articles in Comparative Politics, Electoral
Studies, and the International Political Science Review. He is the author of several books,
the most recent of which is Stuffing the Ballot Box: Fraud, Reform, and Democratization
in Costa Rica (Cambridge University Press, 2002) (Iván Molina, coauthor).
Lehoucq has coordinated multidisciplinary projects, including ones on
decentralization in Bolivia and Guatemala as well as a study of rural collective action in
eastern Guatemala. He has been the Principal Investigator of a Collaborative Projects
Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities that resulted in several
14
publications, including Stuffing the Ballot Box. He has also worked closely with each
member of the team as both a participant and director of the DEP’s Diplomado en Análisis
Político-Estratégico.
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15
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16
Langston, Joy. 2002. “Breaking Out is Hard to Do: Exit, Voice, and Loyalty in Mexico’s
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Langston, Joy. 2003. “Rising From the Ashes: Reorganizing and Unifying the PRI’s State
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293-316.
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New York: Cambridge University Press.
Nacif, Benito. 2002. “Understanding Party Discipline,” in Scott Morgenstern and Benito
Nacif, eds., Legislative Politics in Latin America. New York: Cambridge
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Mexicana de Sociología, 65(1): 41-76.
Negretto, Gabriel and Josep Colomer. 2003. “Gobernanza con poderes divididos en
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17
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18
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19
Appendix – Team members’s curriculum vitae
20
FRANCISCO JAVIER APARICIO-CASTILLO
204 Ilona Court, Stafford, VA 22554
Home: (540)659-4265 / Mobile: (540)379-0717 / Mexico: +52(222)240-2820
Web page: mason.gmu.edu/~faparici
E-mail: [email protected]
STARTING FALL 2003
Professor-Researcher
Political Studies Division
CIDE - Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas, A.C.
México City
DOCTORAL STUDIES
Ph.D. in Economics
Dissertation:
Advisor:
Primary fields:
Secondary fields:
Expected completion:
George Mason University, Fairfax, VA
1999 to present
“Campaign Finance, Electoral Competition and Economic Policy”
Thomas Stratmann
Public Economics, Political Economy/Public Choice
Industrial Organization, Applied Econometrics
August 2003
PREDOCTORAL STUDIES
M.A. in Economics
ICPSR Summer Program Scholar
Advanced Topics in Economics
Summer School
Scholarship and Society Seminar
B.A. in Economics
International Studies Summer School
on Contemporary México
George Mason University
2002
University of Michigan–Ann Arbor
2001
ISEG
2000
Lisbon, Portugal
University of Virginia
2000
Universidad de las Américas–Puebla,
1999
Puebla, México
El Colegio de México
1993 and 1995
México City
TEACHING EXPERIENCE
George Mason University
Macroeconomic Principles, Lecturer
Econometrics I (Ph.D. level), Teaching Assistant
Universidad de las Américas–Puebla
Microeconomics (MA level), Lecturer
Industrial Organization (Undergraduate), Lecturer
Intermediate Macroeconomics, Teaching Assistant
Microeconomic Principles, Teaching Assistant Fall 1993
Instituto Carlos Pereyra
Basic Economics (High School), Lecturer
Summer 2003
Spring 2003
Summer 2001 and 2002
Summer 2002
Fall 1995
1993-1994
21
RESEARCH EXPERIENCE
George Mason University
RA for Thomas Stratmann, Ph. D.
James M. Buchanan Center for Political Economy
Political economy of campaign finance
RA for Sharon Brown-Hruska, Ph. D.
School of Management
Financial microstructure and regulation
Secretaría de Finanzas del Estado de Puebla, México
Public Investments Planning Supervisor
State and municipal investments planning
Secretaría de Hacienda y Crédito Público, México City
Budget Planning Research Intern
Federal public expenditures decentralization program
Universidad de las Américas–Puebla
RA for Fausto Hernández Trillo, Ph. D.
Department of Economics
Analysis of the Mexican financial system
FELLOWSHIPS AND AWARDS
George Mason University
James M. Buchanan Center for Political Economy Fellowship
School of Management Graduate Assistantship
National Science and Technology Council (CONACYT) México
International Studies Scholarship
2002-2003
2001-2002
1998-1999
Summer 1995
Spring 1994
2002-2003
2001-2002
1999-2003
PAPERS
“Campaign finance law and economic policy in the states, 1950-1999,” with Thomas
Stratmann. Under review at the Journal of Public Economics.
Do campaign finance laws affect policy choices? This paper presents evidence on the
effect of campaign contribution limits on state fiscal policy from 1950 to 1999 in all US
states. To do so, we exploit the cross-state variation of limits on contributions from
individuals, corporations and labor unions during the period. Results indicate that more
stringent contribution limits are correlated with larger spending per capita, and lower taxes,
relative to unregulated states. The result for taxes is sensitive to the majority party in the
House: In states with contribution limits, Republican Houses tax less, but Democrat
Houses tax more, than states with no contribution limits.
“Competition policy for elections: Do campaign contributions limits matter?” With Thomas
Stratmann. Under review at the American Journal of Political Science.
This paper examines whether campaign contribution restrictions have consequences for
election outcomes. States are a natural laboratory to examine this issue. We analyze state
House elections from 1980 to 2001 and determine whether candidates’ vote shares are
altered by changes in state campaign contribution restrictions. We find that limits on
giving narrow the margin of victory. Limits lead to closer elections for future incumbents,
but have less effect on the margin of victory of incumbents who passed the campaign
finance legislation. Contribution limits also increase the number of incumbent defeats and
we find some evidence that they increase the number of candidates in the race.
“Campaign finance law and primary elections competition,” working paper.
22
PAPER PRESENTATIONS
“Campaign finance and economic policy in the states, 1950-1999.” Presented at:
Public Choice Society Meetings, Nashville, TN.
March 2003
James M. Buchanan Center for Political Economy Brown Bag Seminar.
October 2002
“Competition policy for elections: Do campaign contributions limits matter?”
(With Thomas Stratmann) Presented at:
American Economic Association Meetings, Washington, DC
January 2003
Public Choice Society Meetings, San Diego, CA.
March 2002
PERSONAL INFORMATION
Born in 1972, Mexican citizen, single. Fluent in English and Spanish. J-1 visa since 1999.
REFERENCES
Thomas Stratmann, Ph.D.
Department of Economics
Center for Study of Public Choice
James M. Buchanan Center for Political Economy
George Mason University
MSN 1D3 - Carow Hall
4400 University Drive, Fairfax, VA 22030
(703)993-2317 / Fax: (703)993-2323
E-Mail: [email protected]
W. Mark Crain, Ph.D.
Department of Economics
Director of Center for Study of Public Choice
James M. Buchanan Center for Political Economy
George Mason University
MSN 1D3 - Carow Hall
4400 University Drive, Fairfax, VA 22030
(703)993-2325 / Fax: (703)993-2323
E-mail: [email protected]
23
ALLYSON LUCINDA BENTON
Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas, A.C.
División de Estudios Políticos
Carretera México-Toluca 3655
Lomas de Santa Fé
México D.F. C.P. 01210
Telephone: (52) 55-5727-9800, x 2408
Fax: (52) 55-5727-9871
U.S. Address (Courier Service to México):
MBE 83-205
827 Union Pacific
Laredo, Texas 78045
Home Telephone (México): (52) 55-5286-1780
E-mail: [email protected]
Education
M.A., Ph.D.
B.A.
University of California, Los Angeles, Department of Political Science,
March 1996, November 2001
University of California, Berkeley, Major in Political Science, Minor in
French Literature, May 1991
Publications in Refereed Journals
“Presidentes fuertes, provincias poderosas: el caso de Argentina,” Política y Gobierno, Vol X,
Núm. 1, Primer Semestre de 2003.
Articles and Working Papers Under Review
“Dissatisfied Democrats or Retrospective voters? Economic Hardship, Political Institutions, and
Voting Behavior in Latin America,” revise and resubmit from Comparative Political Studies.
“The Uneasy Coexistence of Strong Presidents and Powerful Provinces in Argentina During
Economic Crisis and Reform,” revise and resubmit from Latin American Politics and Society.
“What Explains the Survival of Machine Politics in Latin America? The Political Effects of Fiscal
Transfers in the Era of Economic Reform, the Case of Argentina,” under review at Comparative
Politics.
“The Strategic Struggle for Patronage: Political Careers, State Largesse, and Factionalism in Latin
American Parties,” under review at the Journal of Theoretical Politics.
“What Explains the Survival of Machine Politics in Latin America? The Political Effects of Fiscal
Transfers in the Era of Economic Reform, the Case of Argentina,” submitted for review as a
Documento de Trabajo to the División de Estudios Políticos, Centro de Investigación y Docencia
Económicas, A.C..
Published Working Papers
“Dissatisfied Democrats or Retrospective Voters? Economic Hardship, Political Institutions, and
Voting Behavior in Latin America,” Documento de Trabajo, No. 153, División de Estudios
Políticos, Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas, A.C., December 2002.
“The Strategic Struggle for Patronage: Political Careers, State Largesse, and Factionalism in Latin
American Parties,” Documento de Trabajo, No. 151, División de Estudios Políticos, Centro de
Investigación y Docencia Económicas, A.C., December 2002.
24
“Economic Reform in Decentralized Systems: When Institutions Work to Protect Subnational
Politicians from Economic Reform,” Documento de Trabajo, No. 150, División de Estudios
Políticos, Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas, A.C., December 2002.
“When do Parties Survive Economic Ruin? The Political Uses of Fiscal Transfers in an Era of
Economic Uncertainty,” Documento de Trabajo, No. 149, División de Estudios Políticos, Centro de
Investigación y Docencia Económicas, A.C., December 2002.
“Strong Presidents, Powerful Provinces: The Political Economy of Party Building in Argentina’s
Federal System,” Documento de Trabajo, No. 148, División de Estudios Políticos, Centro de
Investigación y Docencia Económicas, A.C., December 2002.
Selected Conference Papers
“The Provincial Origins of National Economic Instability in Argentina,” delivered at the Latin
American Studies Association’s XXIV International Congress, Dallas, Texas, March 27 –29, 2001.
“The Political Institutional Context of Retrospective Voting in Latin America or Why Latin
Americans Have Long Economic Memories,” delivered at the American Political Science
Association’s Annual Meetings, Boston, August 2002 and at the first Latin American Political
Science Conference at the Universidad de Salamanca, Salamanca, Spain, July 9-11, 2002.
“Federalism and the Stability of Provincial Party Systems in Argentina: Regional Development
Policies, Fiscal Resources, and Provincial Politics During Economic Reform,” Latin American
Studies Association’s XXIII International Congress, Washington, D.C., September 2001 and
American Political Science Association’s Annual Meetings, Washington, D.C., August 2000.
Consulting Work
Banco Interamericano de Desarrollo (Inter-American Development Bank), Red el Gestión y
Transparencia del Diálogo Regional de Política, June 15 - December 2, 2002. Mexican consultant
for a project evaluating the state of Latin American public sector employment and civil service
systems.
Awards, Fellowships, and Grants
William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, Iniciativas Académicas Sobre América Latina, 2002-2003.
Chancellor’s Dissertation Year Fellowship, University of California, Office of the President, 19992000.
Best Conference Paper Submitted by a Graduate Student, 1997-1998. Department of Political
Science, University of California, Los Angeles, 1998.
Dissertation Field Research Fellowship, International Studies and Overseas Programs, University
of California, Los Angeles, 1997-98.
Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellowship, Title VI award for the study of Spanish, 1996-97.
Research Grant, Ford Foundation and International Studies and Overseas Programs
Interdisciplinary Program for Students of Developing Areas, 1996.
Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellowship, Title VI award for the study of Portuguese, 199596.
Research Grant, Ford Foundation - International Studies and Overseas Programs Interdisciplinary
Program for Students of Developing Areas Grant, 1995.
25
GABRIEL L. NEGRETTO
Amsterdam 188 # 301
Col. Condesa, Mexico D.F.
EDUCATION
Fall 1993-March 2000
Tel. (52) (55) 55745078
E-mail: [email protected]
Columbia University, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, New York.
Ph.D., Political Science.
Dissertation title: “Constitution-Making and Institutional Design: Distributing
Power Between Government and Opposition in Three Argentine Constitutions
(1853-60/1949/1994)”
1991-1993
Columbia University, School of International and Public Affairs, New York.
Master of International Affairs.
Certificate in Latin American Studies.
1987-1989
Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences, Buenos Aires.
Master of Arts in Social Sciences.
1981-1987
University of Buenos Aires, School of Law, Buenos Aires.
Juris Doctor.
Graduated with honors (magna cum laude).
HONORS
1994-1998
Summer 1997
1995-1996
1993-1994
1992-1993
1992
1991-1993
• Columbia University, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, President’s
Fellow.
• Institute of Latin American and Iberian Studies, C.U., Travel Fellowship.
• Organization of American States, P.R.A. Fellowship.
• Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas, Fellowship.
• Columbia University, School of International and Public Affairs, Scholarship.
• Andrew Wellington Cordier Essay Prize, Journal of International Affairs.
• Fulbright Scholarship.
TEACHING EXPERIENCE
Fall 1999-CIDE, División de Estudios Políticos, Mexico City.
Spring 2003
Assistant Professor of Political Science, Introduction to Rational Choice,
Comparative Political Institutions, Constitutional Design and Institutional
Choice.
1987-1991
1987-1989
University of Buenos Aires, School of Law, Buenos Aires.
Assistant Professor, Constitutional Law.
Assistant Professor, Political Science.
RESEARCH EXPERIENCE
2000-2002
The William & Flora Hewlett Foundation, Mexico City
Research Fellow, developed a two year project called “ Decree Powers and Rule
of Law in Latin America: The Cases of Brazil, Argentina, and Colombia.
05-08 1996
Universidad Torcuato Di Tella, Buenos Aires.
Visiting Researcher, conducted fieldwork on the constitutional reform of 1994.
26
1991-1993
National Council of Scientific and Technical Investigations, Buenos Aires.
Graduate Fellow, developed a two-year project on emergency powers and
political instability in Argentina.
1988-1989
National Council of Scientific and Technical Investigations, Buenos Aires.
Junior Researcher, developed a two-year project on the constitutional role of the
Military in Argentina.
PUBLICATIONS
Books
• El Problema de la Emergencia en el Sistema Constitucional. Buenos Aires:
Rodolfo Depalma, 1994. Introduction by Dr. German Bidart Campos.
Articles in refereed journals
• “Government Capacities and Policy Making by Decree in Latin America: The
Cases of Brazil and Argentina,” Comparative Political Studies, accepted,
publication pending, February/March 2004.
• “Diseño Constitucional y Separación de Poderes en América Latina,”Revista
Mexicana de Sociología, No1, Abril 2003.
• (co-authored with Josep Colomer)”Gobernanza con Poderes Divididos en
América Latina,” Política y Gobierno, Vol. 10, No1, primer semestre de
2003.
• “¿Gobierna Sólo el Presidente: Poderes de Decreto y Diseño Institucional en
Brasil y Argentina?,” Desarrollo Económico, Vol. 42, Octubre-Diciembre
2002.
• “Hobbes´Leviathan: The Irresistible Power of a Mortal God,” Analisi e
Diritto, 2002.
• “El Constitucionalismo Puesto a Prueba: Decretos Legislativos y Emergencia
Económica en América Latina,” Isonomía, No 14, March 2001
• “Procesos Constituyentes y Distribución de Poder: La Reforma del
Presidencialismo en Argentina,” Política y Gobierno, Vol. 8, No 1, primer
semestre de 2001.
• “Repensando los Poderes del Ejecutivo en América Latina,” Nueva Sociedad,
No. 170, November 2000.
• (with the collaboration of José Antonio Aguilar) “Liberalism and Emergency
Powers in Latin America,” Cardozo Law Review, May 2000.
• (with the collaboration of José Antonio Aguilar) “Rethinking the Legacy of
the Liberal State in Latin America: The Cases of Argentina (1853-1912) and
Mexico (1857-1910),” Journal of Latin American Studies, May 2000.
• “Constitution-Making and Institutional Design: The Transformations of
Presidentialism in Argentina,” Archives Européennes de Sociologie, New
York, Vol. XL, No 2, Fall 1999.
• (co-authored with Mark Ungar) “Estado de Derecho e Independencia del
Poder Judicial en América Latina: Los Casos de Argentina y Venezuela,”
Revista de Política y Gobierno, México, Vol. 4, No. 1, May 1997.
• “Que es el Decisionismo?,” Revista Mexicana de Ciencias Politicas, México,
No. 161, July-September 1995.
• “El Concepto de Decisionismo en Carl Schmitt: El Poder Negativo de la
Excepción,” Sociedad, Buenos Aires, No. 4, May 1994.
• “Emergencia y Crisis Constitucional en la Argentina,” El Derecho, Buenos
Aires, No. 8341, October 1993.
27
• “Kant and the Illusion of Collective Security,” Journal of International
Affairs, New York, Columbia University, No. 45, February 1993.
• “Un Criterio Muy Particular: La Doctrina de la Corte Suprema sobre Golpes
de Estado,” Nuevo Proyecto, No. 8, Buenos Aires, March 1992.
• “Legitimidad Democrática de la Concertación Social,” Revista de Derecho
Público y Teoría del Estado, Buenos Aires, No. 3, June 1989.
Book Chapters
• “Compromising on a Qualified Plurality Rule,” in Josep Colomer (ed.), The
Hanbbook On Electoral System Design, Palgrave, forthcoming, November
2003.
• “Los Dilemas del Republicanismo Liberal en América Latina: El Caso de la
Constitución Argentina de 1853,” in José Antonio Aguilar Rivera y Rafael
Rojas (eds), Para Pensar el Republicanismo en Hispanoamérica, Fondo de
Cultura Económica, Noviembre 2002.
• “Hacia una Nueva Visión de la Separación de Poderes en América Latina,”
en Miguel Carbonell y Rodolfo Vazquez (eds.), Estado de Derecho y
Democracia, Siglo XXI, Julio 2002.
Review Articles
• “State Formation and Democracy in Latin America,” Journal of Latin
American Studies, February 2001.
• “Estructuras Partidarias y Democratización en América Latina.” Comentario
al libro de Fernando López-Alves, State Formation and Democracy in Latin
America, en Política y Gobierno, Vol. 8., No 2, segundo semestre de 2001.
• “Comentarios a Eduardo Zimmermann (ed.), Judicial Institutions in
Nineteenth Century Latin America,” Política y Gobierno, Vol. VII, No 2,
segundo semestre de 2000.
• “Reflexiones acerca de Executive Decree Authority, de John Carey y
Matthew Shugart,”Política y Gobierno, Vol. VII, No 1, primer semestre de
2000.
• “La Crisis del Voluntarismo Jurídico,” Revista de Derecho Público y Teoría
del Estado, No.1, Buenos Aires, March 1987.
Newspapers and Magazines
• “Argentina en su Laberinto”, Contextos, Diario Milenio, January 27, 2002
• “La reforma Institucional en México,”Nexos, January issue, 2002
• “Mito y Realidad de la Alternancia,” Contextos, Diario Milenio, December
2, 2001
• (con Guillermo Trejo) “Digna Ochoa y el Rostro Oculto de la Reforma del
Estado”, Suplemento Contextos, Diario Milenio, Novembre 4, 2001
• (con Guillermo Trejo) “Los Derechos Humanos como Show, Suplemento
Contextos, Diario Milenio, 18 de Noviembre de 2001
• “Sin Recetas Fáciles: Transición a la Democracia y Reforma del Poder
Judicial en América Latina,” Enfoque, Diario Reforma, August 13, 2000.
WORK IN PROGRESS
•
•
Constitution Making and Institutional Design in Latin America, booklength manuscript
Governance with Divided Powers, book co-authored with Josep Colomer
28
BENITO NACIF-HERNANDEZ
OFFICE ADDRESS: CIDE
División de Estudios Políticos
Carretera México-Toluca 3655
Lomas de Santa Fe
Mexico D.F.
01210, MEXICO
Tel. (52) 57279828
Fax (51) 57279871
EDUCATION
•
•
D. Phil. in Politics, St. Antony’s College, University of Oxford, 1995. Dissertation title: “The
Mexican Chamber of Deputies; the Political Significance of Non-Consecutive Re-election.”
B. A. in Public Administration, Centro de Estudios Internacionales. El Colegio de Mexico,
1984-1988. Thesis title: “Cambios en el tamaño del gobierno mexicano, 1970-1987.”
PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
•
•
•
•
•
•
Chair of the Division of Political Studies at CIDE (Center for Research and Teaching in
Economics) from July, 2000 to present.
Research Professor, Division of Political Studies at CIDE from October, 1995 to present.
Editor of Politica y gobierno, from April, 1997 to 2000.
Analyst for Oxford Analytica from September, 1993 to 1999.
Head of the Department of Quantitative Analysis at the Advisory Office of the Presidency of
the Republic from January 1989 to September, 1990.
Analyst for the Advisory Board of the Undersecretary of Housing of the Federal Secretary of
Urban Development and Environment from August, 1988 to December, 1988.
TEACHING EXPERIENCE
•
•
•
•
•
•
Introduction to Political Science, Undergraduate Program in Political Science and International
Relations at CIDE, Fall Semester 2002.
Formal Models for Public Policy Analysis, M. A. Program in Public Policy and Administration
at CIDE, Fall Semester, 1999.
Political Theory, Undergraduate Program in Political Science and International Relations at
CIDE, Spring Semester,1999.
Political Philosophy, Undergraduate Program in Political Science and International Relations at
CIDE, 1996, 1997.
Selected Topics on Public Administration, Undergraduate Program in Public Administration at
El Colegio de Mexico, Spring Semester, 1996.
Mexican Politics, Undergraduate Program in Political Science and International Relations at
CIDE, Spring Semester, 1996.
AWARDS
•
Residential Fellow at the Hellen Kellogg Institute for International Studies, University of Notre
Dame, Spring Semester, 2001.
29
•
•
•
•
Member of the National Research System of CONACYT (The National Council of Science
and Technology), Level One, June 1999.
Winner of the Francisco I. Madero Prize for best essay on the topic “Governability and
Alternation of Power” with the paper entitled “The Logic of Change and Paralysis under
Governments without Majority”.
CONACYT Scholarship for graduate study at St. Antony’s College, the University of Oxford,
from October 1992 to September 1995.
The British Foreign Office and Commonwealth Scholarship in support of doctoral studies in
politics at St. Antony’s College, the University of Oxford, from October 1990 to September
1992.
PUBLICATIONS
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Scott Morgenstern and Benito Nacif (eds.), Legislative Politics in Latin America, Cambridge,
Cambridge University Press, 2002.
Carlos Elizondo Mayer-Serra and Benito Nacif (eds.), La lógica de la liberalización política en
Mexico, México D.F., CIDE-Fondo de Cultura Economica, 2001.
“El sistema de comisiones permanentes en la Camara de Diputados” en German Perez
Fernandez del Castillo (ed.), La Camara de Diputados en Mexico, Mexico D.F., Facultad
Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales, 2001.
“El Congreso mexicano: cambios y continuidades” en Maria Amparo Casar (ed.), El sistema
politico mexicano y sus instituciones: una introducción, Mexico D.F., CIDE-Oceano.
Forthcoming.
“El impacto del Partido Nacional Revolucionario en las relaciones ejecutivo-legislativo, (19281934)”, en Ignacio Marvan and Maria Amparo Casar (eds.), Gobiernos Divididos en Mexico,
1867-1997, Mexico D.F., CIDE-Oceano, 2001.
“La rotacion de cargos legislativos y el sistema de partidos en Mexico”, Política y gobierno,
vol. IV, num. 2, 1997. pp. 115-145.
“La no reelección legislativa, disciplina de partido y subordinación al ejecutivo en la Cámara
de Diputados de Mexico”, Dialogo y debate de cultura política, vol. I, num. 1, 1997. pp. 149167.
“El tamaño del gobierno mexicano”, en Maria del Carmen Pardo (ed.), Lecturas de
administración pública, Mexico D.F., Instituto Nacional de Admistracion Publica, 1992. pp.
105-127.
“Gobiernos locales y descentralizacion”, en Maria del Carmen Pardo (ed.), Lecturas de
administración pública, Mexico D.F., Instituto Nacional de Admiistracion Publica, 1992. pp.
57-78.
PARTICIPATION IN SEMINARS AND CONFERENCES
•
•
•
“Policy Making under Divided Government in Mexico”, Annual Meeting of the American
Political Science Association, Boston Marriot Copley Place and Sheraton Boston Hotel and
Towers, September, 2002.
“El Congreso mexicano: continuidad y cambio”, paper presented at the Latin American Studies
Association XXI Congress, Chicago Ill., September 24-26, 1998.
“The Struggle for the Presidency and the Political Survival of Legislators in Mexico, 19281934”, paper presented at the Latin American Studies Association XXI Congress, Chicago Ill.,
24-26 September, 1998.
30
FABRICE E. LEHOUCQ
Date and Place of Birth: November 1, 1963, New York, New York.
Current Position:
Research Professor
Division of Political Studies
Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas (CIDE)
Carret. México-Toluca 3655
Lomas de Santa Fé, México City, México
Tel. No.: (52 55) 5727-9800, x2215 & Fax No.: (52 55) 5727-9871
E-mail: [email protected]
EDUCATION:
M.A., Ph.D., Political Science, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina (Dissertation Title: “The
Origins of Democracy in Costa Rica in Comparative Perspective”), December 1986, 1992.
B.A in Politics, Philosophy, and Economics; Certificate in Latin American Studies, University of
Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, April 1984.
FELLOWSHIPS AND GRANTS:
Principal Investigator, Collaborative Projects Grant, National Endowment for the Humanities,
January 1996-December 1998 (“Fraud, Electoral Reform, and Democracy: Costa Rica in
Comparative Perspective”), Amount awarded: $140,000.
Fulbright Scholar, Council for International Exchange of Scholars, May 1995 (Lecture and
Research at the University of Costa Rica, July - December 1995).
Research Grant, American Political Science Association, May 1995 (“The Electoral Bases of Public
Expenditures in Guatemala”).
Residential Fellow, Helen Kellogg Institute, University of Notre Dame, South Bend, Indiana, Spring
1992.
International Doctoral Research Fellowship, Latin American & Caribbean Program, Social Science
Research Council, 1987.
Graduate Fellowship, Department of Political Science, Duke University, 1984-87.
Harry S. Truman Scholarship, 1982.
PROFESSIONAL APPOINTMENTS:
Research Professor, Division of Political Studies, CIDE, Mexico City, Mexico, August 2001-present.
Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of Government, Wesleyan University (Middletown, CT),
Fall 2000-Spring 2001.
Research Associate & Coordinator, Center for the Study of Population, Institutions, and
Environmental Change (CIPEC), Indiana University (Bloomington, IN), Spring 1997-Summer 2000.
Assistant Professor, Department of Government and Public Affairs, Christopher Newport University
(Newport News, VA), Fall 1992 - Spring 1997.
RELATED PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE:
Coordinator, Diploma in Electoral Marketing, CIDE, November 2002-March 2003; Coordinator,
Module on Political Institutions, Diploma in Political and Strategic Analysis, CIDE, November 2001December 2002, April-May & October-November 2002.
Consultant, Electoral Laws and Returns Project directed by Professor Mark P. Jones (Department
of Political Science, Michigan State University) and funded by the National Science Foundation,
August 2000-December 2001.
31
Visiting Professor, M.A. Program in Electoral Law and Electoral Systems, Autonomous University
(“Benito Juárez”) of Oaxaca, February-July 2003.
PUBLICATIONS:
Books:
Stuffing the Ballot Box: Fraud, Reform, and Democratization in Costa Rica (Iván Molina, coauthor),
Cambridge Studies in Comparative Politics (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002).
Urnas de lo inesperado: Fraude electoral y lucha política en Costa Rica (Iván Molina, coauthor)
(San José: University of Costa Rica Press, 1999).
Instituciones democráticas y conflictos políticos en Costa Rica (San José: National University
Press, 1998).
Lucha electoral y sistema político en Costa Rica, 1948-1998 (San José: Editorial Porvenir, 1997).
Articles in Scholarly, Refereed Journals:
“Explaining Voter Turnout Rates in New Democracies: Guatemala,” (David L. Wall, coauthor),
Electoral Studies, forthcoming.
“The Local Politics of Decentralized Environmental Policy in Guatemala,” (Clark Gibson, coauthor),
Journal of Environment and Development, Vol. 12, No. 1 (March 2003): 28-49.
“Does Tenure Matter to Resource Management? Property Rights and Forest Conditions in
Guatemala,” (Clark G. Gibson and John T. Williams, coauthors), Social Science Quarterly, Vol. 83,
No. 1 (March 2002): 206-25.
“Can Parties Police Themselves? Electoral Governance and Democratization, “ International
Political Science Review, Vol. 23, No. 1 (January 2002): 29-46 (Reprinted in Hugo A. Concha
Cantú, ed., Sistema representativo y democracia semidirecta: memoria del VII Congreso
Iberoamericano del Derecho Constitucional [México, D.F.: Instituto de Investigaciones Jurídicas,
UNAM, 2002]: 383-410).
“Institutionalizing Democracy: Constraint and Ambition in the Politics of Electoral Reform,”
Comparative Politics, Vol. 32, No. 4 (July 2000): 459-77 (For a slightly longer version and Spanish
translation, see: “Institucionalización de la democracia: trabas y ambiciones en la política de la
reforma electoral,” Foro Internacional [Mexico, D.F.], Vol. 41, No. 1 [January-March 2001]: 104-36).
“Democratización y gobernabilidad electoral: el caso de Costa Rica (Iván Molina, coautor),
(Democratization and Electoral Governability: The Case of Costa Rica),” Política y Gobierno
(México, D.F.), Vol. IX, No. 1 (January-June 2002): 135-179.
“Political Competition and Electoral Fraud: A Latin American Case Study,” (Iván Molina, coauthor),
Journal of Interdisciplinary History, Vol. 30, No. 2 (Autumn 1999): 199-234 (For an updated version
and Spanish translation, see: “La competencia política y el fraude electoral: un caso
latinoamericano,” Revista Mexicana de Sociología, Vol. 61, No 9 [July-September 1999]: 103-37).
“The Institutional Foundations of Democratic Cooperation in Costa Rica,” Journal of Latin American
Studies, Vol. 28, No. 2 (May, 1996): 329-355.
“Institutional Change and Political Conflict: Evaluating Alternative Explanations of Electoral Reform
in Costa Rica,” Electoral Studies, Vol. 14, No. 1 (March 1995): 23-45. (This also is available as
Working Paper No. 189, Helen Kellogg Institute, University of Notre Dame, [January 1993]).
“Class Conflict, Political Crisis, and the Breakdown of Democratic Practices in Costa Rica:
Reassessing the Origins of the 1948 Civil War,” Journal of Latin American Studies, Vol. 23, No. 1
(February 1991): 37-60 (A Spanish-language translation appears in Revista de Historia
[Heredia/San José, Costa Rica], No. 25 [January-June 1992]: 65- 96).
32
Articles Solicited from Scholarly Journals:
“The 1999 General Elections in Guatemala,” Electoral Studies, Vol. 21, No. 1 (Jan. 2002): 107-14.
“Presidencialismo, leyes electorales y estabilidad democrática en Costa Rica (Presidentialism,
Electoral Laws and Democratic Stability in Costa Rica),” Revista Parlamentaria (San José, Costa
Rica), Vol. 4, No. 3 (December 1996): 1031-60.
“The Elections of the Century in El Salvador,” Electoral Studies, Vol. 14, No. 2 (June 1995): 17983.
“The Costa Rican General Elections of 1994,” Electoral Studies, Vol. 14, No. 1 (March 1995): 6972.
Chapters in Books:
“Electoral Fraud: Causes, Types, and Consequences,” Annual Review of Political Science, Vol. 6
(Palo Alto, CA: Annual Reviews, Inc., 2003): 233-56.
“Modifying Majoritarianism: The Origins of the 40 Percent Threshold,” The Handbook of Electoral
System Choice, ed. By Josep. M. Colomer (New York and London: Palgrave, 2003).
“La economía política de la inestabilidad política: Dana G. Munro y su estudio sobre Centroamérica
(The Political Economy of Political Instability: Munro and his Book on Central America,” in Dana
Gardner Munro, Las cinco repúblicas de centroamérica (San José: University of Costa Rica Press,
2003): 1-22 (With Molina, I oversaw the Spanish language translation of this book, first published
by Oxford University Press in 1918).
“Las Bases Institucionales y Sociológicas de la Asistencia Electoral en Guatemala, 1985-1995
(The Social and Institutional Foundations of Turnout Rates in Guatemala),” El Sistema político y la
estructura electoral en Guatemala, ed. by Edelberto Torres-Rivas (Guatemala: FLACSO, 2001).
“Government and Politics,” (Part I) Costa Rica: A Country Study, ed. by Rex Hudson (Washington,
D.C.: Library of Congress, forthcoming), 71pp.
“Investigando bajo la lluvia (Research Beneath the Rain),” Ciencia Social en Costa Rica:
experiencias de vida e investigación, Marc Edelman, et. al. (San José: EUCR-EUNA, 1998): 37-60.
“Social and Spatial Correlates of Turnout in Guatemala: the 1985 Elections” (David L. Wall,
coauthor). Conference of Latin Americanist Geographers Yearbook, vol. 23, ed. by David
Robinson (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1997): 133-49.
“La dinámica política-institucional y la construcción de un régimen democrático: Costa Rica en
perspectiva latinoamericana (Institutional Dynamics and the Construction of a Democratic Regime:
Costa Rica in Latin American Perspective),” Construcción de las identidades y del Estado moderno
en Centro América, ed. by Jean Piel and Arturo Taracena (San José: CEMCA/EUCR, 1995): 15163.
Articles In Progress:
“Classifying Democracy: Indicators, Data, and Central America,” (Kirk Bowman and James M.
Mahoney, coauthors). To be submitted to the American Political Science Review.
“Solving Coordination Problems and Creating a Two-Party System: Parties, Factions, and Christian
Democrats in Costa Rica,” Under review at Party Politics.
"Constitutional Design, Separation of Powers, and Electoral Governance: Evidence From Mexico."